The delicate subject of Christmas
by Agent Mississippi
Summary: RvB: Christmas is such a... delicate subject in blood gulch. Just ask Tucker; his head is still stuck in the television set. NO SLASH. OC/Caboose.


**Now I know what you all are thinking: "Wha...? ANOTHER CHRISTMAS STORY?" but I wrote another one, so there.**

**Well this is actually for a contest on deviantART, but I like it, so I decided to post it here too. **

**Yep. That's it.**

**Also Dawn belongs to Shason66 on deviantART. If you're interested in her, go to Shason66's profile to learn more!**

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><p>Christmas was a very delicate subject in a little box canyon in the middle of nowhere. This particular one began with a tall nineteen year old boy with sand colored hair running through the kitchen, past a black man in his early twenties who was drinking coffee and leaning against the fridge. He rolled his eyes when he saw the blonde one go by.<p>

"Fucking idiot," He scoffed to himself and went back to his coffee.

The boy skidded through the hall in his cobalt pajamas and stumbled into his superior officer's bedroom, who had been sleeping fairly pleasantly until a big blue blur had pounced on top of him.

"Church! Church! Church! Church! Church! Church! Church! Church! Chu-"

"Goddamnit, _what? _What the hell do you want, Caboose?" He shouted, and got a large goofy grin in return.

"Do you think Tex wants a cat for Christmas?"

Church's eye began to twitch and his face flushed with anger, while a small part of his mind tried (without much success) to imagine Tex delicately cradling a small kitten, with her red hair falling in her face while she bent down to stroke it's fur lovingly. The conflicting emotions of anger and amusement in his brain battled it out, until anger finally won as his face continued to heat up.

"What is wrong with you?" He finally managed to ask incredulously.

"Is… is that a no?" Caboose sniffed as his eyes got large and watery.

"What the fuck…? Of course it is! Now get the hell out of my room!"

Caboose left with a hanging head and went to wake up Dawn, his girlfriend, and according to him, the nicest person in the canyon. That could be debatable with other members of blue base. And probably red base too, due to the blonde jokes incident. He pushed the door to her small room open and looked down at her sleeping form. Her black hair was splayed across a white pillow, and the light shining on her through a window made the crimson tips of her hair even more defined. The short side of her hair was pressed against the bed as she slept, making it more tangled every time she shifted. She wore a loose white tank top and green shorts that were partially covered by the mess of sheets laying over her.

"Wake up Dawn," He whispered gently and poked her.

"Mmph."

She turned on to her back, threw her sheets off drowsily, stretched, then turned back on to her right side and went back to sleep.

"Come on Dawn, it's Christmas morning! Wake up!" Caboose whined quietly.

"Hmm? Christmas?" She asked, now slightly awake.

"Yep," He smiled and brushed a large clump of hair off of her pale face.

"Can we have Christmas cookies?" She asked childishly with her eyes still glued shut. He nodded happily in return.

"Yes, but you have to get up first."

She nodded lazily, but stayed in bed.

"Come on! Let's get some cookies, Dawn!" He began to poke her more, but she swatted his hand away and lifted up her arms in his direction.

"Carry me?"

So that's how Caboose ended up in the kitchen, holding a sleeping girl awkwardly in his arms with her hands wrapped around his neck. He shifted her on to his hip with ease and used his now free right hand to get a glass of orange juice from the fridge, oblivious to the dirty looks Tucker was giving him.

"Fuck him… that could be me holding a hot girl… What the hell is wrong with her?" Tucker grumbled to himself and wandered into the rec room.

"Dawn? Could you please wake up? I can't drink my orange juice…."

"Can I have cookies?" Dawn murmured groggily and blinked.

"Yes!"

"Okay," She shook herself awake and jumped out of Caboose's arms.

"Hey Church! Do you want to help make Christmas cookies?" Caboose questioned perkily and opened the fridge to look for his idea of cookie ingredients.

"No thanks…. Have fun blowing up the kitchen you idiots," Church mumbled as he followed Tucker, who had begun to play video games. Caboose grinned at Dawn and pulled out a bag of what vaguely resembled flour, a carton of milk, a couple of unusually large and misshapen eggs, and a bag of chocolate chips.

"Oh yeah, we don't want you two screwing in the kitchen while we're not in there, okay?" Tucker shouted from across the base. Dawn frowned in the direction of his voice.

"Dude, you're talking to the two dumbest people in the universe. I don't think they even know what that means." Church's voice floated into the kitchen in response to Tucker. Dawn's frown turned into a glare and she stomped into the room that the other blues were occupying.

"Dawn! Uh… I didn't mean… I don't…. um, please don't hurt me?" Tucker's timid apology echoed throughout the room, followed by a growl and a loud crash.

"Not the face! Not the face! No no no wait!" Another clatter resounded in the canyon and Caboose poked his head through a doorway to find Tucker's head in the television set, and Dawn standing in front of him, admiring her handiwork.

"You broke the TV, you bitch!" Church shouted angrily, apparently forgetting what Dawn had just done to Tucker. She crossed her arms and started walking towards him.

"Wait!" Caboose ran in between her and Church.

"Please do not hurt Church, Dawn. He is my best friend. Now let's go make cookies."

"Okay Caboose, let's go." She entwined her fingers with his and they pleasantly walked back to the kitchen, completely forgetting about Tucker, who was still stuck in the television. Caboose pulled out a dirty plastic bowl from under the small kitchen sink. Dawn poured half of the milk and all of the flour in to the bowl, making up measurements as she went along. She finally picked up the eggs and turned to Caboose.

"I forgot… do we put in the eggs in, or the eggshells?"

Caboose shrugged in response, so Dawn just dropped the eggshells in with the yolks.

"Do you want to mix it?" She offered a spatula to Caboose after dropping a pound of chocolate chips in, and he nodded enthusiastically.

"I'll heat up the oven." She bent over to turn the oven on to 800 degrees, which just happened to be the highest temperature that very advanced oven could reach.

"Since the temperature is more than double of the normal one, we'll double the time to cook it too! So… 40 minutes!" She estimated after a moment's pause and looked at Caboose, expecting him to nod or approve of her idea. He just smiled and went back to his mixing.

After getting Tucker's head out of the TV, Church hesitantly crept into the kitchen, going out of his way to avoid Dawn, and grabbed two beers from the fridge.

"Hey Church! Will you make some hot chocolate for us?" Caboose requested while he stirred the mess of random ingredients.

"No." He replied without looking up.

"What if I said… pretty please?"

"No means no, dipshit."

"Is that so? Well what if I said pretty please?" Dawn asked sweetly, though her face wore a glare and her arms were crossed.

"_Shit._" Church mumbled under his breath before getting out the remainder of the milk and a bottle of chocolate syrup. He poured the milk sloppily into two mugs on the counter and shoved them in the microwave. He shifted uncomfortably while Dawn stared him down and Caboose put a plastic container of milk, flour, and chocolate in the oven. Church grabbed the mugs once they were finished heating up, then poured some chocolate into them and stirred it in, under close scrutiny from Dawn. Then he realized what Caboose was doing.

"Uh, Caboose? Isn't it toxic to put plastic in an oven?" Church hesitantly gestured to the oven with now boiling plastic inside of it.

"Oh no! The cookies!" Caboose shouted in alarm and began to jump up and down. Dawn picked up an oven mitt to try and salvage the "cookie" mixture that was quickly becoming a burned black residue on the oven. The oven mitt quickly caught on fire and she dropped it in alarm, directly on the unfinished wood floor, which the flames licked up until a few panels were charred black.

"Oh shit! Put it out! Put it out!" Church began to run around frantically, looking for something to smother the fire.

"With what?" Caboose cried out in response.

"Anything big you moron! Whatever you can find!"

"Hey Church! Where are those beers! Also, what are you assholes shouting about over- holy shit!" Tucker nearly leapt into Church's arms when he came out of the other room and into the burning kitchen.

"I found something!" Caboose shouted and threw a big bag on the fire. The bag, was in fact a bag of ammunition and explosives, that when making contact with the fire, spewed rockets and bullets in all directions. The blues and Dawn sprinted out of the base, but not before grabbing a six pack of beers and the two mugs of hot chocolate. They ran up a small hill and got as far away from the base as possible without getting noticed by the reds. Dawn sat down in the grass beside Caboose, Church collapsed on to a dirt path with a beer in his hand, and Tucker sat perched on his rock that most of the others were too scared to touch. Dawn and Caboose smiled at each other as he handed her a hot chocolate. The entire base finally went up in flames, and they watched in awe at a safe distance. Dawn leaned her head on Caboose's shoulder and giggled when a crystal of frozen water landed on her small nose.

It was snowing.

"What the hell…? Oh you've got to be kidding! Today of all days has to be the only day that it has _ever _snowed here! This is the worst fucking day ever!" Tucker complained while laying out on the suspicious looking rock, and Church just looked at the sky in disbelief.

"Yay!" Caboose let out a shout of joy and he and Dawn began to jump up and down in delight.

"Yay? Are you two insane?" Church turned his look of astonishment in their direction and scoffed, before Dawn stopped bouncing and scowled at him.

"Uh… I mean, sure. Whatever you say…"

Tucker rolled his eyes before downing his beer and opening another, while Caboose and Dawn watched the base burn happily and sip their hot chocolates.

Church looked around and shrugged, smiling despite the situation.

"Well, merry Christmas motherfuckers."

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><p><strong>Like it? Hate it? LET ME KNOW!<strong>


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